10 Instances of Botched Crisis Management

Every large corporation faces public scrutiny - it comes with the territory of being a publicly traded company.

Because of this constant attention, almost all big companies face a potentially scandalous situation at some point. How these businesses handle the situations can have a lasting impact on their brand - positive or negative.

Here at iQ Media, we are very invested in how PR teams can handle a crisis for their brand as it arises by getting all the facts, apologizing, and maintaining a sympathetic and human perspective on the situation. But often, brands fall short of conveying empathy, and the proceeding negative publicity is then self-inflicted by delivering a poor customer experience. Some examples of situations like this include:

Chipotle's massive data breach.

United Airlines' infamous dragging incident.

Samsung's exploding cell phones.

Carnival's "poop cruise".

The folks over at GetCRM have put together a visual that analyzes these and similar fiascos to uncover how much these gaffes cost their respective companies.

Looking at the impact on stock prices showed how much value was lost from each incident and how long it took each brand to recover (or still languish). The impact of a bad customer experience just goes to show how much negative publicity through earned media can adversely affect a brand, and not just their reputation.